I wish I had met my Dad sooner. My relationship with him (now 2 years old) makes a huge difference in my life and his. And I’m proud of my courage for finally reaching out to him. 👨👧
I’d be happy to talk with you about it. I treasure the letter he wrote back to me, and wrote a very touching poem about it. Many of these reunions do not end positively. I got to embrace the possibility of rejection. I made it clear that I wasn’t angry, I just had questions. Since I already had no relationship with him, I reckoned I had nothing to lose.
In 2023, I decided to start therapy with a gender-affirming therapist, and shortly thereafter came out and started transition. So...Lots of changes. And I definitely wish I'd done it sooner!
I love this. My whole life I've been predisposed to eagerly embracing change, so much so that I've often thought that my true life lesson is to find greater satisfaction in the NOW, rather than always looking ahead to the exciting future that change can bring.
For many years I considered going back to grad school to support a change in my career (I also just like school). The huge investment gave me pause and I had close friends recommend against it. "You don't need grad school to make a career change. Just start doing the work you want to do." True, but I kinda just wanted to go to grad school.
After nearly 10 years of hemming and hawing (and forgetting about it entirely for awhile) I finally decided to go for it and it was the best thing I've ever done. It's definitely the change I wish I'd made earlier (though I suspect that my 50-year-old self needed that enlivening experience far more than my 40-year-old self did, so maybe it all worked out).
The one thing I use to give myself some encouargement during these "earlier" bits of thinking is to understand I wouldn't have listened to this earlier anyway. I wasn't mentally ready, nor was I physically. Today is the right day to do it because I am actually paying attention. Sure, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, but no one mentions the fact that plot of land was once a giant parking lot and needed to be tilled and rotated over to fertile ground again.
Give yourself some grace, it is the best thing to have handy.
For sure. Whenever someone asks about the advice I'd give "my younger self," I always say my younger self wouldn't have wanted advice—from future me or anyone else. 😀
The last big change I made was to stop drinking — definitely one that I feared in advance that has brought so much relief afterward!
Something I want to change is getting more sleep. I am a chronic stay-up-too-later! There are so many things I want to do, read, and try, and I constantly push off my bedtime to do, read, and try all of them. But my schedule being what it currently is, I need to be up by a certain time of day, which means I’m often left bleary and regretful when I wake up. When I was younger, I had a very “I’ll sleep when I’m dead!” mentality, but now, getting enough sleep feels like an anchor habit that makes every other part of my life better. I’ve got an Oura ring to help me track my hours of sleep and sleep quality, and I’m moving ever closer to my goal of 8-9 hours a night. It’s helping ☺️
I’m one of your readers who loves change, Chris; always have and it’s always manifested as setting and pursuing big goals. (And sometimes blowing my life up!) But I’ve started to realize how much changing the “basics” in life -- how I treat my body, the health of my relationships -- allows me to successfully accomplish all the other big changes too.
Hello from a fellow chronic stay-up-too-later! I find that I try to stretch those nighttime hours because I feel like it's the only time that's truly mine. The rest of my day is spent taking care of responsibilities and needs and I don't carve out any day time for my wants.
I wish we I would have done the emotional work around decluttering sooner. I was always getting rid of things here and there, but in 2023 I focused on reading books that talked about the why of having too much stuff, and took a good look at our impulse spending, where we spent our money vs the things we actually used and enjoyed, and how we felt in our house.
At the end of the year we cleared about 1K things out of our daughter's room, I completed a 465 things out challenge and added another 500 to it. I also doubled down on the storage and organizational systems that work for me and us.
And I committed to journaling every day about purchases made and my husband and I have money meetings weekly.
The result? Lots of people who would actually use the things we weren't using for them, we are moving toward our financial goals, and we are all so much happier. It takes less time to cleanup, and we have so much more time, so we are doing things together more and I am getting things done that I've wanted to do forever.
I wish I would have committed to doing all of this before because it's improved my life so much.
The 465 things challenge did involve 1 thing on day 1, 2 on day 2, so on for 30 days, with a total of 465 things at the end. The biggest thing that helped me with this? I didn't do it day by day. I just did the numbers. I decided it was more important to get the things out than to do it day by day. So on day 1 I think I knocked out five or six numbers! I also made a tracker to color in when I got rid of stuff; I'm a visual learner and it really helped.
In general for clearing out, we take everything out and look at it as a whole, then put things back in purposeful places. We knew our daughter's room was going to be a lot, and we were going to get rid of a lot. Once we had all of that ready to go out I was inspired to tackle my desk to add to the things we were giving away.
I'm also doing a 2024 things in 2024 challenge, trying to get rid of a ton more stuff! Challenges really work for me. And I know we have a lot more we can get rid of, particularly in our attic.
I also just recently went through my books again, and am only keeping ones I think I'll re-read again. So now there's a pile to bring to the used bookstore, and a pile to give away.
Honestly it also helps that we live in a small space. We are confronted by our stuff every day. And I wish I would have decided earlier that our time was worth more than picking up the stuff all the time.
Let me know if you have any more questions! I'd be happy to answer them!
Thank you for sharing Laura's article about sobriety. One of my most important changes was releasing alcohol. I'd toyed around with the idea as I'd started to notice some issues with how I was drinking and the amount I was drinking. I finally decided to give being alcohol free a try in March of 2020, but March 2020 was an interesting time in all our lives and it didn't quite stick. I made it about 20 days. In July 2020, a friend invited me to do Whole30 with her and I agreed. I haven't taken another drink since. For this change, I've found that staying stopped is easier than starting and stopping again, so I'm staying stopped.
I just made a huge change and quit my government job of 20+ years because it was making me utterly miserable. I do kind of wish I'd done it years ago, but the advantage of sticking it out for so long is that now I have very comfortable savings that will carry me for a year or two while I build up an art business -- so no second guessing the timing of when I made the change. I am THRIVING without the daily burden of that job and excited to see what I can make of this gift of time.
I quit my USPS letter carrier job twice and ended up going back a third time to a different government agency. Luckily for me they offered an early out retirement which I didn't waste a minute accepting. I was eligible for my federal pension at age 56.
In the break between the first and second resignation I applied for and received a two year re-entry student scholarship and graduated with a BFA in photography. A lot of fits and starts. I've been retired for nine years and done some interesting things. Bernie Sanders delegate in 2016. I got selected for the Phoenicia Hotel Art Photo competition in 2017 which I also entered on a whim. One photographer a month for a year and the Phoenicia Beirut comped me a room & meals. The lesson for me has been to apply for everything because you've got nothing to lose.
I think of some changes like “walking the plank” and jumping off the ship into the ocean. No idea what will happen, no “how” available. Thanks for expressing it this way. Sometimes we just can’t “know the how” before we take the first step.
I waited too long to get my daughter into therapy but when I noticed the warning signs, I got both of us in. She's a better person now and so am I. Now if I could only budget.....
If impulse spending is a problem, what's helped me is committing to write down what I spend each day. This has stopped me from making many purchases that I don't really need!
My goal is to run a 5k in all 193 UN-recognized countries + Palestine & the Holy See. So far I’ve run races in Cuba 🇨🇺, Palestine 🇵🇸, Lebanon 🇱🇧, Cyprus 🇨🇾, Greece 🇬🇷, Turkey 🇹🇷 and Canada 🇨🇦. Possibly make a country like Portugal a home base and take regional airlines from there. I’m researching immigration to Portugal under the Portugal D7 Visa, aka the Retirement Visa.
I'm planning to run the 100th anniversary of the Košice Peace Half Marathon on October 6, 2024. An early ally of Nazi Germany, Slovakia joined the Axis powers in 1940. I think the 100th peace marathon is a tribute to their better nature ☮️ 🕊
"Until one is committed there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way." ~ William H. Murray, mountaineer, in "The Scottish Himalayan Expedition."
I made a small change today, but it felt big: I used the gym at my co-working space. I prefer to exercise outdoors alone or at home, but in mid-winter with ice on the sidewalks it doesn’t feel safe enough to run, so I took the risk. Often a new routine feels overwhelming as I don’t know the routine, but it worked out and I’m glad I took the risk. If I can get proper cardio in once or twice a week here, I know the benefit of lower anxiety overall will far outweigh the jitters of trying something new.
What’s the last big change you made? The list is long....After 28 years with my husband I finally decided to move on. I went from being a contract worker to a full time salaried position. I stopped drinking for the health of it, not because it was a problem. This is all in the last three months.
What’s something you want to change? (Don’t worry if you’re not sure how to do it just yet.). To allow myself take on less, because I suffer from responsibility. The less I say yes to the more fun I can have.
"I'm all for change, as long as I don't have to do anything different." Discuss. I think this is a lazy way to be. There are people who talk about change and then there are people willing to do the work.
In May last year I returned to the gym (after 3 years of haphazard focus due to lockdowns).
I started with one PT session a week.
At the end of October I decided to commit fully (3 days a week) to a weight training program I’d purchased at the beginning of 2022. My focus was to get through the first course of 8 weeks. That would take me right through to Christmas Eve.
And I did it. I stuck with it. (I gave myself a stamp for each workout on a month to a page calendar I have hanging in the toilet- the analogue version of Streaks). Achieving this goal gave me renewed faith in myself that I could commit and follow through. And that I could do it on my own without needing to pay a personal trainer.
My body is getting stronger and I enjoy going to the gym now - this has been a massive change for me.
I have some new changes to make this year to build on the regular weight training.
I wish I’d started sooner but now is better than not at all.
I feel so much more seen by your statement that your audience is pro-change than any standardized niche! I’m in the midst of changing everything in my business and loving it! While it would have been great to do this (doing things MY WAY) years ago, I wasn’t ready. I needed the contrast of trying to follow the rules to drive my expansion. I needed a true embodiment of my Human Design to brave enough to be the weirdo who does things very differently.
I wish I had met my Dad sooner. My relationship with him (now 2 years old) makes a huge difference in my life and his. And I’m proud of my courage for finally reaching out to him. 👨👧
I'm so glad you reached out!
Your courage is contagious, Lisa. One of my goals this year is to reach out to my biological father, and your message is encouraging.
I’d be happy to talk with you about it. I treasure the letter he wrote back to me, and wrote a very touching poem about it. Many of these reunions do not end positively. I got to embrace the possibility of rejection. I made it clear that I wasn’t angry, I just had questions. Since I already had no relationship with him, I reckoned I had nothing to lose.
In 2023, I decided to start therapy with a gender-affirming therapist, and shortly thereafter came out and started transition. So...Lots of changes. And I definitely wish I'd done it sooner!
I love this. My whole life I've been predisposed to eagerly embracing change, so much so that I've often thought that my true life lesson is to find greater satisfaction in the NOW, rather than always looking ahead to the exciting future that change can bring.
For many years I considered going back to grad school to support a change in my career (I also just like school). The huge investment gave me pause and I had close friends recommend against it. "You don't need grad school to make a career change. Just start doing the work you want to do." True, but I kinda just wanted to go to grad school.
After nearly 10 years of hemming and hawing (and forgetting about it entirely for awhile) I finally decided to go for it and it was the best thing I've ever done. It's definitely the change I wish I'd made earlier (though I suspect that my 50-year-old self needed that enlivening experience far more than my 40-year-old self did, so maybe it all worked out).
The one thing I use to give myself some encouargement during these "earlier" bits of thinking is to understand I wouldn't have listened to this earlier anyway. I wasn't mentally ready, nor was I physically. Today is the right day to do it because I am actually paying attention. Sure, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, but no one mentions the fact that plot of land was once a giant parking lot and needed to be tilled and rotated over to fertile ground again.
Give yourself some grace, it is the best thing to have handy.
For sure. Whenever someone asks about the advice I'd give "my younger self," I always say my younger self wouldn't have wanted advice—from future me or anyone else. 😀
The last big change I made was to stop drinking — definitely one that I feared in advance that has brought so much relief afterward!
Something I want to change is getting more sleep. I am a chronic stay-up-too-later! There are so many things I want to do, read, and try, and I constantly push off my bedtime to do, read, and try all of them. But my schedule being what it currently is, I need to be up by a certain time of day, which means I’m often left bleary and regretful when I wake up. When I was younger, I had a very “I’ll sleep when I’m dead!” mentality, but now, getting enough sleep feels like an anchor habit that makes every other part of my life better. I’ve got an Oura ring to help me track my hours of sleep and sleep quality, and I’m moving ever closer to my goal of 8-9 hours a night. It’s helping ☺️
I’m one of your readers who loves change, Chris; always have and it’s always manifested as setting and pursuing big goals. (And sometimes blowing my life up!) But I’ve started to realize how much changing the “basics” in life -- how I treat my body, the health of my relationships -- allows me to successfully accomplish all the other big changes too.
Hello from a fellow chronic stay-up-too-later! I find that I try to stretch those nighttime hours because I feel like it's the only time that's truly mine. The rest of my day is spent taking care of responsibilities and needs and I don't carve out any day time for my wants.
So much same, Dawn! I’ve heard it called “revenge bedtime”. I totally relate!
I wish we I would have done the emotional work around decluttering sooner. I was always getting rid of things here and there, but in 2023 I focused on reading books that talked about the why of having too much stuff, and took a good look at our impulse spending, where we spent our money vs the things we actually used and enjoyed, and how we felt in our house.
At the end of the year we cleared about 1K things out of our daughter's room, I completed a 465 things out challenge and added another 500 to it. I also doubled down on the storage and organizational systems that work for me and us.
And I committed to journaling every day about purchases made and my husband and I have money meetings weekly.
The result? Lots of people who would actually use the things we weren't using for them, we are moving toward our financial goals, and we are all so much happier. It takes less time to cleanup, and we have so much more time, so we are doing things together more and I am getting things done that I've wanted to do forever.
I wish I would have committed to doing all of this before because it's improved my life so much.
I’d love to know if there were any particular things that were especially effective for you with this.
Is the challenge one thing a day? Or does it double? Or is it something else entirely?
Hi Jen!
The 465 things challenge did involve 1 thing on day 1, 2 on day 2, so on for 30 days, with a total of 465 things at the end. The biggest thing that helped me with this? I didn't do it day by day. I just did the numbers. I decided it was more important to get the things out than to do it day by day. So on day 1 I think I knocked out five or six numbers! I also made a tracker to color in when I got rid of stuff; I'm a visual learner and it really helped.
In general for clearing out, we take everything out and look at it as a whole, then put things back in purposeful places. We knew our daughter's room was going to be a lot, and we were going to get rid of a lot. Once we had all of that ready to go out I was inspired to tackle my desk to add to the things we were giving away.
I'm also doing a 2024 things in 2024 challenge, trying to get rid of a ton more stuff! Challenges really work for me. And I know we have a lot more we can get rid of, particularly in our attic.
I also just recently went through my books again, and am only keeping ones I think I'll re-read again. So now there's a pile to bring to the used bookstore, and a pile to give away.
Honestly it also helps that we live in a small space. We are confronted by our stuff every day. And I wish I would have decided earlier that our time was worth more than picking up the stuff all the time.
Let me know if you have any more questions! I'd be happy to answer them!
Thank you for sharing Laura's article about sobriety. One of my most important changes was releasing alcohol. I'd toyed around with the idea as I'd started to notice some issues with how I was drinking and the amount I was drinking. I finally decided to give being alcohol free a try in March of 2020, but March 2020 was an interesting time in all our lives and it didn't quite stick. I made it about 20 days. In July 2020, a friend invited me to do Whole30 with her and I agreed. I haven't taken another drink since. For this change, I've found that staying stopped is easier than starting and stopping again, so I'm staying stopped.
" staying stopped is easier than starting and stopping again, so I'm staying stopped." <-- lots of application to this concept
I just made a huge change and quit my government job of 20+ years because it was making me utterly miserable. I do kind of wish I'd done it years ago, but the advantage of sticking it out for so long is that now I have very comfortable savings that will carry me for a year or two while I build up an art business -- so no second guessing the timing of when I made the change. I am THRIVING without the daily burden of that job and excited to see what I can make of this gift of time.
You did it! Congratulations! 🏆
I quit my USPS letter carrier job twice and ended up going back a third time to a different government agency. Luckily for me they offered an early out retirement which I didn't waste a minute accepting. I was eligible for my federal pension at age 56.
In the break between the first and second resignation I applied for and received a two year re-entry student scholarship and graduated with a BFA in photography. A lot of fits and starts. I've been retired for nine years and done some interesting things. Bernie Sanders delegate in 2016. I got selected for the Phoenicia Hotel Art Photo competition in 2017 which I also entered on a whim. One photographer a month for a year and the Phoenicia Beirut comped me a room & meals. The lesson for me has been to apply for everything because you've got nothing to lose.
Congratulations and good luck!
Good for you! I would love to know how you “ apply for everything” - how did you find out about these contests?
The thing I want to change is my need to ‘know the how’ before taking the first step.
I think of some changes like “walking the plank” and jumping off the ship into the ocean. No idea what will happen, no “how” available. Thanks for expressing it this way. Sometimes we just can’t “know the how” before we take the first step.
That’s what I’m learning as I ‘imperfectly practice imperfect practice’.
I waited too long to get my daughter into therapy but when I noticed the warning signs, I got both of us in. She's a better person now and so am I. Now if I could only budget.....
Your mileage may vary, but there's YNAB: ynab.com.
If impulse spending is a problem, what's helped me is committing to write down what I spend each day. This has stopped me from making many purchases that I don't really need!
My goal is to run a 5k in all 193 UN-recognized countries + Palestine & the Holy See. So far I’ve run races in Cuba 🇨🇺, Palestine 🇵🇸, Lebanon 🇱🇧, Cyprus 🇨🇾, Greece 🇬🇷, Turkey 🇹🇷 and Canada 🇨🇦. Possibly make a country like Portugal a home base and take regional airlines from there. I’m researching immigration to Portugal under the Portugal D7 Visa, aka the Retirement Visa.
Ah! Naturally I love this project. Are you sharing more about it anywhere?
@susanmhallrunner on Instagram
I'm planning to run the 100th anniversary of the Košice Peace Half Marathon on October 6, 2024. An early ally of Nazi Germany, Slovakia joined the Axis powers in 1940. I think the 100th peace marathon is a tribute to their better nature ☮️ 🕊
This is exciting! I’ll check out the IG.
"Until one is committed there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way." ~ William H. Murray, mountaineer, in "The Scottish Himalayan Expedition."
I made a small change today, but it felt big: I used the gym at my co-working space. I prefer to exercise outdoors alone or at home, but in mid-winter with ice on the sidewalks it doesn’t feel safe enough to run, so I took the risk. Often a new routine feels overwhelming as I don’t know the routine, but it worked out and I’m glad I took the risk. If I can get proper cardio in once or twice a week here, I know the benefit of lower anxiety overall will far outweigh the jitters of trying something new.
What’s the last big change you made? The list is long....After 28 years with my husband I finally decided to move on. I went from being a contract worker to a full time salaried position. I stopped drinking for the health of it, not because it was a problem. This is all in the last three months.
What’s something you want to change? (Don’t worry if you’re not sure how to do it just yet.). To allow myself take on less, because I suffer from responsibility. The less I say yes to the more fun I can have.
"I'm all for change, as long as I don't have to do anything different." Discuss. I think this is a lazy way to be. There are people who talk about change and then there are people willing to do the work.
In May last year I returned to the gym (after 3 years of haphazard focus due to lockdowns).
I started with one PT session a week.
At the end of October I decided to commit fully (3 days a week) to a weight training program I’d purchased at the beginning of 2022. My focus was to get through the first course of 8 weeks. That would take me right through to Christmas Eve.
And I did it. I stuck with it. (I gave myself a stamp for each workout on a month to a page calendar I have hanging in the toilet- the analogue version of Streaks). Achieving this goal gave me renewed faith in myself that I could commit and follow through. And that I could do it on my own without needing to pay a personal trainer.
My body is getting stronger and I enjoy going to the gym now - this has been a massive change for me.
I have some new changes to make this year to build on the regular weight training.
I wish I’d started sooner but now is better than not at all.
I feel so much more seen by your statement that your audience is pro-change than any standardized niche! I’m in the midst of changing everything in my business and loving it! While it would have been great to do this (doing things MY WAY) years ago, I wasn’t ready. I needed the contrast of trying to follow the rules to drive my expansion. I needed a true embodiment of my Human Design to brave enough to be the weirdo who does things very differently.